Step inside Amazon's corporate palace

ADVERTISEMENT

Bandai Namco's grim fantasy Dark Souls returns for a third entry this April, offering players of a masochistic persuasion another challenging gothic action-RPG to battle through. Set in the ruined kingdom of Lothric, players will face some of the most terrifying enemies the series has ever seen, while navigating the biggest world developer From Software has ever created.

READ NEXT

Hands on with Dark Souls III

ByMatt Kamen

WIRED: As far back as 2009's Demon's Souls, your games have been renowned for their difficulty. What compels you to make such challenging experiences?Hidetaka Miyazaki: I have no intention to make the game more difficult than other titles on purpose! It's just something required to make this style of game. Ever since Demon's Souls, I've really been pursuing making games that give players a sense of accomplishment by overcoming tremendous odds. We've added new items and weapons over the course of the series, and having a certain level of difficulty adds value to those because they incentivise players to experiment more with character builds and weapon load-outs.

Do you intend for player classes to be balanced, depending on player skill? Or are some deliberately underpowered, to create that greater sense of accomplishment?It really does depend on the classes. They can drastically impact the overall 'difficulty' of the game. I want players to consider how to complete each stage using each class, utilising their strengths and weaknesses. There are different approaches, in both your route through certain areas of the game and how you maximise the attributes of each class. If you choose thief, for example, you'll need to be a lot faster and more careful than if you chose a warrior. Thieves don't have particularly powerful, big attacks, whereas charactets who can use magic, like the pyromancer, have an advantage -- their weapons and items give them an elemental edge. Each player should come up with their own approach to conquering environments in Dark Souls III.

One of the main differences between Dark Souls III and its predecessors appears to be less emphasis on Hollowing. What drove that change?One of the complaints I hear from fans is that they don't want to be 'ugly' when they're Hollow [a degenerative, almost cadaverous character state in previous games, reached after dying and limiting certain game features]. They're playing a character they've spent so much time creating, down to facial detail, and they don't want to lose that. So I decided to add a new state instead, the Lord of Cinder, when you have 'Embers' empowering you. Hollowing is still in the game -- I personally like it -- but it's now more as one of the pillars of the storyline.

ADVERTISEMENT

READ NEXT

Gallery: Hands on with Dark Souls III

ByMatt Kamen

14 items

The Souls series is known for environmental storytelling and implied lore, rather than a direct narrative players work through. What appeals to you about that approach?First of all, I don't dislike direct storytelling -- people seem to think that about my games! Actually, the truth is, I'm just not good at implementing direct narrative in my games. Another side is, I want to leave the interpretation of the world's stories to the player. That's actually my biggest reason for focusing on environmental and subtle storytelling. Rather than the game itself automatically telling the story, the player gets more value from it when they themselves find out hints of plot from items or side-characters they encounter in the world.

Your games embrace a very European visual style, rather than the anime aesthetic found in a lot of Japanese games. What draws you to that?A lot of it comes from experiences I had during my childhood, including through fiction. I've been familiar with western fantasy novels since I was a boy. Since I started working in games professionally, I've had a lot of opportunities to travel abroad and see buildings and landmarks in Europe and even further afield, churches and such, and they serve as great influences too.

ADVERTISEMENT

Were you ever expecting the series' fans to create challenges for themselves, such as the speedruns and alternative control playthroughs?That's been a real surprise. When I was working on the first Dark Souls -- as far back as Demon's Souls, actually -- I didn't expect the player community to come up with speedrun contests or any of the strange new ways to play the games. But I started considering ways to give the players space to do special things like that after the games were launched, so in that sense, my expectations started to meet the fans. I don't believe the player who says he completed the original Dark Soulswithout taking a hit -- it would be amazing but I think it's just an elaborate rumour! Some of the stuff the community has done, collaborating on Twitch, or playing with Guitar Hero controllers, is incredible though. I've been very happy to see that kind of creativity. I don't think I'd ever put in trophies or anything to instigate a particularly strange play style though.

Would you like to see the Dark Souls universe expanded, or experiment with different game genres in that setting?That's a really difficult question for me! I think my philosophy towards game development is first, set a certain game system, and then apply a world view that matches that. When it comes to Souls, first of all I came up with the action RPG game system, and then applied the mythology. I might come up with, for instance, a simulation or strategy system, and then if the Dark Souls world view worked with that system, there could be a chance the universe might expand into that gaming genre. But the other way around doesn't work for me -- I couldn't start from a world view, like Souls, and then make another type of game fit that mold.

Dark Souls III launches on PS4, Xbox One, and PC on 12 April. This article was first published 29 March.